62. And in Antiphanes, in his Soldier or in his Tycho, a man is introduced delivering rules in this way, saying—

Whoever is a mortal man, and thinks
This life has any sure possession,
Is woefully deceived. For either taxes
Take off his property; or he goes to law
And loses all he seeks, and all he has:
Or else he's made a magistrate, and bears
The losses they are subject to; or else
The people bid him a choragus be,
And furnish golden garments for a chorus;
And wear but rags himself. Or as a captain
Of some tall ship, he hangs himself; or else
Takes the command, and then is taken prisoner:
Or else, both waking and in soundest sleep,
He's helpless, pillaged by his own domestics.
Nothing is sure, save what a man can eat,
And treats himself to day by day. Nor then,
Is even this too sure. For guests drop in
To eat what you have order'd for yourself.
So not until you've got it 'twixt your teeth
Ought you to think that e'en your dinner's safe.

And he says the same in his Hydria.

63. Now if any one, my friends, were to consider this, he would naturally and reasonably praise the honest Chrysippus, who examined accurately into the nature of Epicurus's philosophy, and said, "That the Gastrology of Archestratus was the metropolis of his philosophy;" which all the epicures of philosophers call the Theogony, as it were, that beautiful

[[173]]epic poem; to whom Theognetus, in his Phasma or in his Miser, says—

My man, you will destroy me in this way;
For you are ill and surfeited with all
The divers arguments of all the Stoics.
"Gold is no part of man, mere passing rime.
Wisdom's his real wealth, solid like ice;
No one who has it ever loses it."
Oh! wretched that I am; what cruel fate
Has lodged me here with this philosopher?
Wretch, you have learnt a most perverted learning;
Your books have turn'd your whole life upside down;
Buried in deep philosophy you talk
Of earth and heaven, both of which care little
For you and all your arguments.

64. While Ulpian was continuing to talk in this way, the servants came in bearing on some dishes some crabs bigger than Callimedon, the orator, who, because he was so very fond of this food was himself called the Crab. Accordingly, Alexis, in his Dorcis, or the Flatterer, (as also others of the comic poets do,) hands him down, as a general rule, as being most devoted to fish, saying—

It has been voted by the fish-sellers,
To raise a brazen statue to Callimedon
At the Panathenaic festival
In the midst of the fish-market; and the statue
Shall in his right hand hold a roasted crab,
As being the sole patron of their trade,
Which other men neglect and seek to crush.

But the taste of the crab is one which many people have been very much devoted to; as may be shown by many passages in different comedies; but at present Aristophanes will suffice, who in the Thesmophoriazusæ speaks as follows—

A.Has any fish been bought? a cuttle-fish,
Or a broad squill, or else a polypus;
Or roasted mullet, or perhaps some beet-root?
B.Indeed there was not.
A.Or a roach or dace?
B.Nothing of such a sort?
A.Was there no black-pudding,
Nor tripe, nor sausage, nor boar's liver fried,
No honeycomb, no paunch of pig, no eel,
No mighty crab, with which you might recruit
The strength of women wearied with long toil?